Professor Panicos Kyriacou

Overview

Panicos Kyriacou received a B.E.Sc. degree in electrical engineering from the University of Western Ontario, London, Canada, and a M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees in medical electronics and physics from St. Bartholomew’s Medical College, University of London, London, U.K. He is currently a Professor of Biomedical Engineering at the School of Science and Technology, at City, University of London. He is also the Founder and Director of the Research Centre for Biomedical Engineering at City, University of London, UK.

Prof Kyriacou is considered a global leading expert in the fields of Pulse oximetry and Photoplethysmography. His primary research focuses on the understanding of the relation of Photoplethysmography (PPG) and Spectrophotometry with haemodynamics, vascular mechanics and hemorheology. His main motivation is the utilisation of PPG and other optical based modalities for the innovation of new non-invasive disruptive sensor technologies, including wearables, for the early diagnosis of disease and the facilitation of unobtrusive health and fitness monitoring.

Prof Kyriacou has authored and co-authored over 300 publications and holds six patents with inventions in medical optical sensors. Prof Kyriacou has over 25 years of experience in leading major research projects, relating to healthcare technologies, funded by the main UK research bodies, EU and industry.

Prof. Kyriacou served as Vice President Academia, Chair of the Physiological Measurement Group, and Chair of the Engineering Advisory Group at the Institute of Physics and Engineering in Medicine (IPEM), UK. From 2017-19, Prof. Kyriacou also served as President of the European Alliance for Medical and Biological Engineering & Science (EAMBES).

Prof Kyriacou is an Adjunct Professor at Yale Medical School, and Honorary Professor at the Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee. He is also an Honorary Senior Research Fellow at Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children, St. Bartholomew’s Hospital, and The Royal London Hospital in London, U.K. He is a Fellow of IoP, IPEM and IET. Professor Kyriacou is a Chartered Engineer (CEng), Chartered Physicist (CPhys) and Chartered Scientist (CSci).

Prof Kyriacou holds many Editorial leadership positions in various prestigious journals. Currently he is Editor-in-chief of the Elsevier journal Biomedical Signal Processing and Control. He also offers his charitable services to the World Health Organisation (WHO) and UNICEF in the field of affordable healthcare technologies (especially for children) for low resource Nations.

Qualifications

• PhD, Medical College of St. Bartholomew’s Hospital, Queen Mary, University of London, United Kingdom
• MSc, Medical College of St. Bartholomew’s Hospital, University of London, United Kingdom
• BESc, University of Western Ontario, Canada

Employment

• Chief Scientist, Crainio Ltd, August 2022 - present
• Visiting Professor, Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee, India, September 2015 - present
• Adjunct Professor, Yale School of Medicine, United States, September 2010 - present
• Professor of Biomedical Engineering, City, University of London, United Kingdom, August 2009 - present
• Honorary Senior Research Fellow, Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children NHS Foundation Trust, United Kingdom, September 2004 - present
• Director, Research Centre for Biomedical Engineering, City, University of London, United Kingdom, August 2004 - present
• Honorary Senior Research Fellow, St Bartholomew's Hospital, United Kingdom, September 2001 - present

Languages

English (can read, write, speak, understand spoken, peer review) and Greek, Modern (1453-) (can read, write, speak, understand spoken, peer review)

Research

Professor Kyriacou is the Director of the Research Centre for Biomedical Engineering in the School of Mathematics, Computer Science and Engineering.

His main research activities are primarily focused upon the understanding, development and applications of medical instrumentation, biosensors and physiological measurements to facilitate the prognosis, diagnosis and treatment of disease or the rehabilitation of patients. His research pushes the frontiers of current optical and electronic technologies and demonstrates how such technologies can be used as medical “tools”. Prof Kyriacou works closely for several years with a strong clinical team from various prominent clinical institutions and medical devices industries such as Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children, St Bartholomew’s Hospital, The Royal London Hospital, The Royal Marsden, St Andrew’s Centre for Burns and Plastic Surgery, Yale Medical School, GE Healthcare, Draeger, Philips, Intelligent Fabric Technologies plc, etc. One of the main characteristics that make his research internationally renowned is his ability to design, develop and clinically evaluate medical devices and sensors and investigate various pathophysiological phenomena for various clinical applications. The core of his research activities lies the application of electronic, optical and physical techniques to solve practical problems in surgery, anaesthesia and intensive care. Bio-signal processing, mathematical modelling and computed fluid dynamic (CFD) studies of various physiological, anatomical functions and haemodynamic events are also used as a basis for new medical knowledge and instrumentation development. Challenges from various clinical specialities are being addressed, leading to interdisciplinary applications of advanced and novel technologies.

Prof Kyriacou has authored and co-authored over 200 publications; peer reviewed journal publications, invited chapters in books and conference proceedings. He is also the holder of six patents (see below) with inventions in the area of Biomedical Instrumentation and Optical Biomedical Sensors. Prof Kyriacou has attracted external funding in excess of £3m (in the last 10 years) in order to support all his research activities.

Impact and vision of Research

The focus and vision of Prof Kyriacou’s research is to achieve social and economic outcomes, and improve health and wellbeing.

It is now more than 50 years since the time when clinical monitoring of individuals in the home and community settings was first envisioned. Until recently, technologies to enable such vision were lacking. However, the current advancements in sensing, communication and computation technologies can provide the necessary tools to finally implement and deploy affordable and practical technologies with the capabilities required by researchers in the field of health monitoring.
The vision of prof Kyriacou’s Research Centre is to develop new novel medical technologies which will contribute towards some of the main challenges in healthcare, including the early diagnosis of diseases such as congestive heart failure, the prevention and/or management of chronic conditions such as diabetes, improved clinical management of neurodegenerative conditions such as Parkinson's disease, and the ability to promptly respond to emergency situations such as seizures in patients with epilepsy and cardiac arrest in subjects undergoing cardiovascular monitoring.

Wireless non-invasive wearable technologies may provide an integral part of the solution for providing health care to a growing world population that will be strained by a ballooning aging population. By providing a means to conduct telemedicine-the monitoring, recording, and transmission of physiological signals from outside of the hospital-wearable technology solutions could ease the burden on health-care personnel and use hospital space for more emergent or responsive care. Also, such technologies will enable the monitoring of the health and wellbeing of citizens in developing countries where currently state of the art medical devices do not exist. In addition, employing wearable technology in professions where people are exposed to extreme environments, dangers or hazards could help save their lives and protect health-care personnel.

Also his future research efforts will be focused on the development of more complex systems for home monitoring of individuals with a variety of preclinical and clinical conditions with a promise to deliver methodologies that are expected to lead to clinical adoption. Such technological achievements are likely to be a key step toward achieving the goals of effectively monitoring of patients in the home or other remote areas. These efforts are expected to enable a new generation of complex systems with the ability to monitor subjects' status, facilitate the administration of interventions, and provide an invaluable tool to respond to emergency situations.

Expertise

Techniques/Technologies

Optical Sensors
Medical Instrumentation
Tissue/Medical optics
Multi-wavelength Photoplethysmography
Static and Dynamic Spectrophotometry
Near Infrared Spectroscopy
Pulse oximetry
Chemo-metrics
Physiological Measurement
Biosignal Processing


Main Applications

Monitoring of perfusion of tissues or organs in anaesthesia, surgery and intensive care.
Investigation of haemodynamic and vascular mechanics utilizing optical techniques
Non-invasive monitoring of cardiovascular disease biomarkers
Early non-invasive screening of cardiovascular diseases
Non-invasive blood and tissue biochemistry
Diagnostic and monitoring technologies in mental health
Technologies for improved clinical monitoring and management of neurodegenerative conditions

Research students

Publications by category